What ho sed de ting!How you doing, you lot out there? Gosh! You, I guess you are now the proud owners ofThe very first little box set of the re-released singles from Iron Maiden. Well, I've got toSay this, welcome to Not a lot of people know that, part 1. Cause here, I'm here I'mAbout to tell you a few stories now and in the next oooh nine releases of this here boxSets, over the period of the next ten weeks. Now look here, first of all, my goodness, it'sTen years almost to the day... My... Ooh little chickadees out there, oh you've got yourGrubby little hands on Running Free, Burning Ambition, oh gosh! The very first single!Sanctuary, Drifter, and I've Got The Fire, the second singles.. Gosh! The first one wasReleased, as I said, almost ten years to the very day on February 8, 1980. Cor, dear!Here, I'll tell you something, right? You know 'Arry... 'Arry Harris, right, he had a bandCalled Gypsy's Kiss.... Yeah it's disgusting isn't it... And you know what that rhymes withDontya? Well if you don't, I'm not gonna tell ya anyway so there. He had this song calledBurning Ambition, which I suppose was a real sort of drive for 'Arry then because he was,You know, full of ambition to get his music out and play it to people, and he had thisSong. And he was in this band Gypsies Kiss, well they were, cause they couldn't handleThis song. And they turned around and said "'Arry you know look at all these chordChanges and time changes", as he's famous for, and I should know... Come on, give us aBreak. So, he took the song to the band and they've gone, "Oi 'Arry, gypsies kiss off willYa, I can't play that! " And he said, "Oi, I've had enough of this then, I'm gonna go findSome people that can, so kiss you and all". So anyway that's what he did. Not kiss them,No, he did the other thing, you know, what it rhymes with... Mm off. I'll say he pissedOff, so there you go. Whatever. Now he went out and he formed a band, and um.. Uuh,Burning Ambition was actually recorded late in 1979 and originally featured the originalDrummer in fact of.. In fact I think there was one guy before him... But Doug Sampson wasOn drums in those days. Dave double tracked on guitars... You know, he double trackedAnd all.. He doesn't have to though, does he? You know what I'm saying.Well, ok, Running Free as well was also the first art work from Riggsy... Riggsy! Now youKnowi tell people I'm actually from another planet you know cause I'm a bit off the wall,Well I'll tell you this boy owns the other planet, my goodness! No god bless him, he's aDiamond guy I love him, what an artist! He first brought Eddie into the first sleeve on thisThe Running Free single, and Eddie if you remember rightly was standing in the shadows,You never really saw him. But uh, oh my goodness, he brought him out didn't he, on theFirst album all in his glory and splendour, Eddie comes out and go "yeeeeh I'm here," soWatch out folks. Well there, what can you say about it, Running Free, it's a song theBand still to this day plays, it's one of the truly great Iron Maiden songs, I mean not onlyJust because it was their first single, but... What a crack.And now then, well we've gone through that, Burning Ambition we talked about, on theOther side we got Sanctuary... On the other single rather, we've got Sanctuary, DrifterLive, and I've Got The Fire, an old Montrose song. Well this... This was the first top-30Entry actually, it made number 29 and uh, oh you know the boys were really happy itWas released 23rd of May 1980 cor dearie me, it was a couple within a few months ofOne another... You lucky boys and girls! Woah, as I said you've got one every week forTen weeks coming out here... Ah, oh well. This was recorded by the way... The live DrifterAnd I've Got The Fire, was recorded in the Marquee in April 1980. And that was a goodYear, I've got a good drop of wine at home made in 1980, yeah still got half a bottle left,It's really good. I've Got The Fire, it's an old Montrose song as I said, and Steve liked itSo he recorded it live, and it used to be a set opener for the band in those days, but onThe back of that they kind of got into the deal of like not recording sort of Iron MaidenSongs on the b's, this was when the beginnings when b-sides were other people's songsThat the band decided to play.Anyway around this time, they uh, they didn't get top of the pops... Rotten buggers... ButWe all know why, it's the bleedin bbc isn't it? Well you know we'll work out some sort ofAbbreviation for that later on... But anyway they couldn't get on because there was someIndustrial action, you know strikes and all that good stuff, you know what the bbcUsually like to do...You! He moved the broom!Well, is he a labourer? No he f'king well ain't!Well that's it, we're going on strike. Put your teacups up to your face lads, lets go out toThe canteen and have another drink...You know, whatever... Well what can you say, what can you say, strikes all around. SoThe boys didn't get to play top of the pops -- that's no biggie, you know they never playThe band anyway do they? Poxy bbc... Chrity!Anyway funnily enough, around this time it the very first gig I ever did with Iron Maiden,No not actually playing with them like as a band, a full band. I played in a band calledMckitty, and these guys in Mckitty... A guy called Donnovan Mckitty himself, we did a gigIn Belgium, and it was in fact... Not a lot of people know this... But it was in fact Maiden'sVery first European gig, how about that, and I was there! So there! Hmm! Stuff that upYour f'king pipe and smoke it! Right! So there you go. I was, I was really privileged to beThere, and that's when I really first met the band, we got on so well and we had such aRiot.... What can I say?Anyway, you remember the Sanctuary sleeve, you lot? Yeah... Maggie Thatcher... Weeelll,Can you believe it, she was there, you know what she was trying to do... Stupid cow...She was trying to pull down an Iron Maiden poster off the wall. Well, what can you sayAbout that? Not a lot, believe me! She was... I dunno why they called her the ironMaiden, do you? Nothing like this.... I know why! Maybe because she's like Eddie!Hahahaha!Listen! By the way I've got to tell you this little story real quick, allright, I'm running outOf time on this one but nevertheless... You remember Eddie, right? Course you rememberEddie! Well this is the origin of Eddie, right. The band used to have this backdrop whichFeatured this theatrical mask and it sort of spat out all this red dye and smoke and allThat gobby stuff and here's poor old Clive sitting under it getting gobbed on everyNight... "Oy! what's all this?!", he's going, "What's all this red st... You know, this shitComing over my head, I've had enough of that paint", eh.... Anything you could find,Anything they could find they'd sling in it. Anyway, they called him Eddie the Head, see,And it's after an old East-End joke that goes as follows:'Ere, Eddie was very unfortunate, he was born without a body. So nevertheless, hisParents loved him dearly and took him home and placed him on the mantelpiece one day.Well, his family gave him lots of love and attention and he always got loads of presentsOn his birthday kind of... Blowing things, and hats and all that kind of stuff, wow...Anyway one year he was about 16, and the hospital phoned up Eddie's parents and theySaid to them, they said "look, due to modern technology and all those good things thatWe can do with you know all this stuff nowadays, we are now able to build Eddie aBody. " So, with this the parents were soooo excited, they couldn't believe it, and theyCouldn't wait to tell Eddie, I mean this is it, Eddie's gonna have a body! Weeeha!However, as it was close to his birthday, they decided to tell the doctors to go aheadAnd build his body, and then they would surprise him, you know they weren't far awayFrom his birthday... Well, a good birthday present, so anyway... A few weeks later the bigDay arrived, yes, Eddie's birthday. So his parents goes up to him, and walked up to theMantelpiece and "Hello Eddie, how you doin? This year is gonna to be the best birthdayYet! Have we got something for you, such a wonderful present! And his mum's going "OhGoodness Eddie we're so pleased! " And Eddie's going, "Oh no! " said Eddie, "Not anotherFucking hat! "Hahahahaha! Oh, I think it's funny! Shit, it is! It's pretty good innit! Anyway, afterThis... Anyway, Derek came up with the creature Eddie and the body and that on theRecord covers, and the name was just carried over and the rest is history innit? AndEddie's out there, yet he's got to have a bit of nookie before long, that's all I can say